When my colleague, Jenny Galiani, and I talk about our experiences as adoptive parents we are often asked about our kids…Do they know they are adopted? When did you tell them? How are they doing? There is a natural concern and wonder about how our children are handling the fact that they were adopted. There are also lots of stories out there about people that learned they were adopted when they were tweens or teens or even older. Those situations are shocking and can cause a lot of emotional distress for adoptees as they grapple with and reconcile information that was kept secret from them and yet is so critical to their identity.
The preferred practice today is for children to not be able to remember when they learned they were adopted. Our children have always known about their adoption in age appropriate ways. Just like their name, it’s something our children have always known about themselves. When our children were really little we talked about what state they were born in and how we flew there when they were born and brought them home on an airplane. Every year, in addition to their birthday, we celebrate the “Adoption Day” of each of our children, the day their adoption was finalized and we became a forever family. These are just a couple of ways we’ve talked about their adoption since day 1.
It is also common these days to have semi-open and open adoptions where there is some level of contact between birth families and adoptive families throughout the life of the child. We have open adoptions for all three of our children. This gives my husband and I the ability to share details with our children about their birth families, what they look like, what nationality they are, what they are like and so on. We even have contact with them through text messages, emails and sometimes even phone calls and visits. All of these things help our children piece together the facts of their identity so they don’t have to wonder.
The most important thing we make sure our children know about their adoption is that their birth mothers are wonderful, strong women that love them very much. We tell our children that their birth mothers made an adoption plan for them because they wanted to give them something that they knew they could not give any child at the time they were born. For our children, an adoption plan made sure they had a mother and a father to raise them. Our children know their birth mothers made a very selfless decision because of their profound love for them.
For our birth mothers’ extreme courage and faith, we are eternally grateful. My husband and I and our family received 3 gifts beyond all gifts. We tell our kids all the time that we’re the luckiest parents in the world to be their parents!
Even if adoptive parents follow all the recommendations from the professionals on how to raise healthy, confident children, adoptive parents do need to understand that adopted children can and do experience grief over the fact that they were relinquished by their birth mother/family. As adoptive parents, it’s absolutely heartbreaking to think that our children would be sad or feel they are not loved for even one second. We love our children so much we NEVER want them to feel that way! However, it would not be loving of us as their parents to deny or dismiss the real feelings of grief they may experience. Our job is to minimize the emotional impact by being honest with our adopted children about their stories, acknowledging whatever feelings they may have and helping them work through those feelings. There is a lot of knowledge and support out there to help us help our children through this process.
Some say the emotional consequences an adopted child can feel are reasons to oppose adoption. Emotional consequences are something that can be managed and successfully navigated just like any other challenge that may arise from raising any child. If we focus on a negative that can be mitigated, we miss the beauty and power of adoption. I don’t pretend that adoption is the solution to abortion. In my opinion, that answer lies in decreasing the number of unplanned pregnancies. However, while the number of unplanned pregnancies remains so high, adoption needs to be seen and supported for what it is, a loving option to abortion. From sadness and uncertainty and even burden comes joy and peace for everyone involved in adoption…the birth mother and birth family, the adoptive family and the child. Adoption is driven by love and love triumphs!!